Deutsche Telekom: No STB in Pay-TV future

By Colin Mann

Gerry O’Sullivan, SVP Global TV and Entertainment at Deutsche Telekom, has called on pay-TV operators to cut down ‘sacred cows’ and consider future business models which do not rely on hardware in subscriber households.

Delivering a keynote speech at The Digital TV Summit in London, O’Sullivan told delegates: “I’d like to see no hardware in the house apart from the screen,” adding that for pay-TV, set-top-box provision was one of the last hurdles to negotiate in turns of cost. “If we can move away from that, we’ll have a healthier business model,” he declared.

Championing DT’s hybrid satellite/IP platform delivery, he said: “If we want to get to customers, we’ll go any way necessary.”